Drake Sisters 04 - Dangerous Tides

from the road. Jackson emerged, gun drawn, face set, eyes as cold as ice. "Backup's coming, Elle. Take care of Jonas."

    Two more police vehicles arrived, one from the city of Fort Bragg and one highway patrol. They used their cars as a barricade to help protect Jonas from the gunman. Obviously the shooter determined he was outmatched because there was no more gunfire. Other officers arrived and spread out to do a search.

    The residents of the small towns up and down the coast nearly all had scanners and they would come immediately to see if they could help. Many were reserve for the sheriff or fire departments, helping one another when most aid was far away. Jonas was popular and the instant word got out that he was shot, they would come fast and there would be many of them.

    Jackson pushed into the circle, kneeling beside Jonas. Blood was everywhere, soaking into Hannah's clothing, seeping into the ground beneath the sheriff and sprayed across the boulders behind them.

    "Can you save him?" Jackson asked without preamble, his face set in hard lines.

    Libby held her hands an inch away over his body and closed her eyes, feeling for his injuries, mapping them out, seeing them even more clearly than if she were reading an X ray. She swallowed hard. Four bullets had torn through his body, damaging organs and ripping through veins and one artery. She had to fix that fast or he was gone for certain. One lung had collapsed.

    The internal damage was severe. This was going to be very bad. The worst damage and the most dangerous was to the pulmonary artery, the main supplier of oxygen to the lungs. Blood was already filling Jonas's lungs and beginning to suffocate him. If Libby waited for the ambulance to take him to the hospital, it would be too late. There was no way they could repair the artery fast enough to save Jonas—the damage was too severe.

    "Hannah and Elle, you'll have to help me with this fast." Hannah and Elle both could heal to some extent, not with Libby's power, but she needed them. "Jackson, keep everyone else away but tell the paramedics he'll need blood when we're finished. Lots and lots of blood."

    "It could get ugly," Elle cautioned. "We aren't in Sea Haven and people from all these towns know Jonas and don't know us."

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    "Just get it done. No one will bother you," Jackson promised.

    Libby could feel the desperation in her sisters—in the gathering crowd as they arrived from nearby towns, some already weeping. The mob was growing larger and she caught a glimpse of the ferocity on Tyson's face as he arrived, striding toward them with determination. She closed her eyes, took a deep cleansing breath and focused everything she was—everything in her—on Jonas.

    The pain hit with the force of a hurricane, a terrible intensity that took her breath and robbed her of her ability to think. She heard the collective gasp from her sisters and forced herself to rise above the agony, to take them with her. She needed their strength and focus, the tremendous circle of energy they could generate together. She called up the light and energy that was always there, always waiting, from somewhere deep inside her. It welled up and poured through her to Jonas. Her sisters connected; Hannah, nearly as strong even in healing as Libby; Elle, equal to Hannah, a force to be reckoned with.
    Sarah, Kate, Abigail and Joley sent their energy, their strength surging into the three sisters as they healed Jonas.

    Libby focused on the worst of the injuries, the artery in desperate need of repair. She'd been right, Jonas would have died if they'd waited to transport him. He might die now, his wounds were so severe. She breathed away the fear and concentrated on the mess in his chest and abdomen, the two worst wounds.
    She felt Hannah and Elle with her and it was a comfort that she wasn't alone trying to fix such a massive destruction of a human being.

    As if in the distance she could hear the wail of the ambulance as it arrived, as the people around them divided into two camps. Matt Granite, Damon Wilder and Aleksandr Volstov stood shoulder to shoulder with Jackson, preventing anyone from getting to the mortally wounded sheriff and interfering with the Drake sisters and their work. Inez from the grocery store joined them, followed by Donna from the gift shop and Gene Dockins and two of his sons. Matt's brothers joined the growing circle around